Town Hall Meeting on
the Proposed
General Education
Transfer Module
University of Oregon
October 6, 2004
Room 177, Lawrence
Hall
3:00 p.m. –
5:00 p.m.
Moderator: W.
Andrew Marcus – University Senate President
Speakers: Peter
Gilkey – Interinstitutional Faculty Senate (IFS) President
Lorraine Davis
– Vice President for Academic Affairs
Karen Sprague
– Vice Provost for Undergraduate Studies
Jim Earl –
Interinstitutional Faculty Senate Represenatative
Introduction:
Andrew Marcus
Joint Boards Articulation Commission (JBAC) system-wide
proposal for facilitating transfer of students between community colleges and
OUS universities.
Discussion:
To provide an overview
of the proposed General Education Transfer module
Request:
Feedback
from all who attended the meeting.
Speaker: Peter
Gilkey
- Faculty
driven process. IFS is busy
organizing similar meetings on all OUS campuses.
- JBAC
wants final comments by November 15th; also State Board
November
- Back
to campus senates in December -- finalized decision
- Goal
is to have module in place by Fall 2005
- Will
do creative listening: what are strengths, difficulties, will JBAC
proposal do the job?
- Why
are we doing this
- Governor
has made higher education for more Oregonians a priority
- Goal—To
help more Oregonians get Bachelor’s degrees
- Legislative
concepts
- Easing
the transfer of student from Community Colleges to OUS Universities
- AA/OT
in place—takes 2 years to complete
- General
Education Transfer module—(see handout yellow sheet)
- Has
been presented to Undergraduate Council
Lorraine Davis:
- State
Board of education has had many changes this year.
- Reorganization
of Chancellor’s office – Provosts’ Council created
- Has
been in session for 5 months
- Strong
emphasis regarding higher education from Gov. office
- Working
groups -- focus on initiatives -- JBAC
- Also
creation of a duel enrollment framework
- Idea
of having a standardized program throughout the OUS system
§ Articulation
of agreements at the university level.
Many agreements already in place.
The goal is to make the transferring process of Community College
students seamless to higher-level education. The intention is to take advantage of programs most
available.
- MBF
Committee working toward seven initiatives; Gen Ed Transfer Mod is one of
them
- 1100
transfer students every year coming into U of O
- General
Education Transfer module is a way to get General Education requirement
completed sooner.
- Path
is: JBAC proposal to CIA and Provosts’ Council and legislators, then
to Faculty Senates and committees
Karen Sprague:
§ General
Education Transfer module can be completed in one academic year
§ Includes
a subset of typical General Education course work
§ Is
transferable among public colleges and universities within Oregon
§ Relies
on courses that faculty on each campus have already designed for General
Education.
§ Does
not replace effective academic advising
§ Student
s will have a lot of chances to be creative
§ Proposal
for statewide system academic records to be connected between institutions.
§ SEE—yellow
sheet with existing transferable degree outline to finish AAPT 35 additional
credits
§ Module—less
courses total 45
§ How
should module be defined
§ Courses
versus credits
§ Has
to add up to 45 credits
§ This
is a work in progress
§ Subject
areas
o Foundational
skills
o Introduction
to disciplines
o Electives
o No
difference in foundational and introduction to disciplines
o Module
will work well
o Asked
for critical comments—very important
Jim Earl:
§ Faculty
considerations with regard to JBAC and other OUS inititatives
§ Very
important to get faculty view to achieve academic excellence and quality.
§ Lowering
barriers?
§ Want
to be certain that excellence will not be eroded by reforms for greater
efficiency
§ Is
the idea of the General Education Transfer module progressive or
regressive? May not want to
encourage greater or “excessive” transferring among schools
§ His
first impression—faculty are leery
§ 25
% increase in number of students while receiving no additional compensation
§ How
needed is it?
§ When
issue was discussed with students they feel that under the current transfer
degrees they are having to take redundant classes from one institution to
another.
§ Students
are transferring from more than one institution.
§ He
felt that faculty should discourage transferring from different institutions and
students should stay at one institution
§ The
idea is to make a seamless change from High School to college – he
contends this transition is not easy; the transition is a big jump, not
necessarily “seemless”.
§ Not
sure he wants to make it easier.
§ Deeply
concerned about consequences
§ Technical
feature—cannot offer degree speech requirement which is an issue because
UO does not teach it anymore – also, UO has 4 credit courses
§ AA/OT
is not living up to UO standards
§ Board
is pushing this will be good, but is it?
State Board representative—Bridgett: She is very
excited about the General Education Transfer module.
Comments from the floor:
- Will
there be a significant increase in the number of transfers if module is
accepted?
Lorraine
· Don’t
know – don’t expect much change, but no real data
Comment from the floor:
· Surprised
number so low number of transfers (about 1100; 400 from CC; 260 from LCC
– about 200 with AA/OT, about 200 without AA/OT.
Lorraine:
- Transfer
from Community College to other OUS systems, etc. wouldn’t expect
more AAOT, but with General Education Transfer module there should be even
more
Shirley—LCC
- Seamless
transition—views transition different
- General
Education Transfer module great idea—if students are able to use it
- Clean
up language\add credits to fulfill General Education across the board.
Karen:
- UO
doesn’t offer those credits—LCC does
- No
foreign language
Jack Bennett:
- Concerns
students are able to obtain AAOT without reading a book, by taking arts,
etc.
Karen:
- Overall
concept—will take General Education to add up to UO
requirements.
Faculty member:
- Do
the students do well after they transfer?
Karen:
- No
data about students repeating courses.
- GPA
usually drops 1 year
- Then
improves thereafter
Jeanne—LCB:
- Confusion
about what this means, students may not know they need additional courses
even after transferring to get their Bachelor’s degree. Does this encourage foreign
languages?
Answer:
Specific questions about General Education Transfer module should be
directed to Karen.
Question: What
is the point of the General Education Transfer module?
Answer:
Provides structure for students
Peter: Not to
require too much of student—very diverse institutions, different
requirements.
- PSU
is very different, OIT too.
- This
is the reason why AAOT may not be effective for all institutions.
Comment from group:
- All
courses are transferable. Is
this a guarantee that they don’t have to retake courses?
What about Communication classes?
Herb Chereck:
- What
courses would satisfy the arts & letters requirement.
- Work
would have to be done
- Students
for business may not take the right social science courses for their
majors.
Heather—LCB
Advising
is very important.
AAOT
should allow them to be able to go right into a professional school/ college
Jim Earl:
Don’t
create a watered down product.
There
is balance that needs to be kept, enormous project
LCB:
- There
is a sheet that outlines courses to take for each institution. But
students may not know unless advised correctly.
Lorraine:
- General
Education Transfer module has to deal with Financial Aide. Allows a
student to take classes with in their means.
- Create
good communication between institutions.
- The
idea is to standardize this for all institutions.
- This
module is designed to ease the process.
- Will
it help? JBAC has the
intention to help students.
Peter:
- No
new statewide committees are needed
- This
is a minimal model
Faculty member:
- New
courses will not be added, and will be put into module.
- How
does this effect existing courses?
Peter:
- Does
this make it so students will not want to take AAOT?
LCC Rep:
- General
Education credits have nothing to do with Major credits.
Lorraine
- This
is the best JBAC has come up with, Community College was very specific @
45 credits. Versus Direct transfer.
Faculty member:
- Language
seems to be confusing
LCC Rep:
- Does
the student have the money to be at a OUS University sooner or later.
- Some
will do AAOT, some not.
- General
Education Transfer module has many advantages to get students here sooner
to be able to take other General Education at UO.
- May
not be able to get the best selection at Community College
Advising:
- Need
to talk more with students
Herb:
- Will
effect how we do business here at the UO.
Peter:
- Wants
comments to be put on webpage to be made publicly
- Dec.
10th meeting @ LCC
Wendy:
- Students
that don’t finish AAOT, some courses will not transfer, but the
General Education Transfer module addresses this issue.
- Concern
is AAOT and General Education Transfer module General Education if not
completed still may not transfer, that is the problem.
Herb:
- Needs
further discussion; outcome is unclear. View courses for all involved. Identified another issue that
needs discussion.
Comments:
- Oregon
doesn’t do well in overall students getting BA or BS. It is the hopes to improve
this. Gov. is trying to solve
a social problem. The
barriers are not intending to make transfers harder.
- Students
should be able to see:
Statewide web-based table to put in numbers how credits apply to
each institution.
Paul Peppis:
- Strongly
stated that this is being created on “feelings” or just by
legislators who don’t really know what we do for our jobs. Political-sidestepping.
Lorraine:
- It
is not based on feelings, but using other models from other states. This is all financially motivated,
allowing students to be able to achieve there degrees cheaper b
OUS Rep:
- Input
is strongly encouraged. There
are definite barriers when transferring from one school to another.
- More
cost effective means needs to be looked at overall for students.
